Palace Beckons For South West After Lottery Funding
07.04.2008 18:21:00
An audience with the Queen for Plymouth veterans, a Shakespeare festival produced by a Hollywood scriptwriter in South Hams and a training programme for surf life savers in North Devon are among the projects set to benefit from grants from the Lottery’s Awards for All programme, announced today. A total of £514,166 is being distributed to 84 groups across the South West in the latest round of awards.
Awards for All is the small grants scheme administered by the Big Lottery Fund on behalf of Lottery good cause funders, Arts Council England, Big Lottery Fund, Heritage Lottery Fund and Sport England. The scheme makes awards of between £300 and £10,000 to grass-roots community groups and voluntary organisations.
Mark Cotton, Big Lottery Fund Head of the South West region, said on behalf of Awards for All: “A tremendous number of different community initiatives have been given a vital boost by Awards for All funding this month. From royal visits or life saving projects, I’m delighted to say we’ve helped 84 different groups with over half a million pounds in total.”
The Plymouth Branch Royal Tank Regiment Association will use its £3,760 grant to send 48 of its veterans, including seven from World War II, to visit the Houses of Parliament and attend a ceremony in which HM The Queen will re-dedicate the regiment’s Standards, in celebration of 90 years of service. They will travel to London on 24 June and attend the commemoration and a Buckingham Palace garden party the following day.
Playgoers Society of Dartington Hall will spend its £1,000 award on a series of workshops overseen by Jonathan Hales, who co-wrote the screenplay for the film Star Wars: Attack of the Clones and worked with renowned director George Lucas on the Indiana Jones movie series. Mr. Hales, whose CV also includes stints as Literary Manager and Director of the Royal Court Theatre, London, and Associate Director at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, will oversee several workshops where a production of Shakespeare’s King John featuring local, amateur actors, will be developed. The production will then be staged from 20 June until 28 June in the landscape gardens of Dartington Hall, Totnes.
Woolacombe Surf Life Saving Club will receive a £5,100 grant to train a dozen adult volunteers in surf live saving skills across three summer sessions. The volunteers will then be qualified to lead teaching sessions with the club’s 80-strong ‘nipper’ section, comprising children aged eight to 13 years old. The North Devon club is experiencing a steady climb in interest and currently boats 120 members, including a 40-strong ‘youth’ section featuring 13 to 18 year olds, a ‘senior’ section featuring 19 to 30 year olds, and a ‘masters’ section for those 30 and over. All members learn basic life saving skills plus specific knowledge of coastal conditions, tide patterns, and sea currents.
Other grants made in this round of awards include GROFUN in Bristol, who will receive £7,961 to run workshops in sustainable horticulture, and Christchurch Ex-Fireman’s Association in Dorset, set to spend its £1,000 grant on a 40th anniversary celebration for members of the South West fire service.
Client name: The Big Lottery Fund
Web link: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
